The Vandal – Derek Haines

Writing can be frustrating While there is always doubt in a writer’s mind, there comes a day when you just know what you have written is not working or that it is simply rubbish. I have just had this day and have decided to trash a project I have been working on now for a few months. There is always the option of cutting, pruning, trimming, re-working or savagely editing, but sometimes the best option is to go back to a blank page and start all over again with a brand new idea. Although a painful and seemingly wasteful decision to make, there does come a time to admit that what you

Writing comes with rich rewards Although I only published the book six months ago, it is now well over a year and a half since I finished writing the story that was so different from anything I’d ever written before. It was probably the most difficult as well because the setting, characters and feelings were so close to me, it was hard to keep remembering that I was writing fiction. With a main character who was based on three friends and my father, all of whom had all passed away in the couple of years before I wrote the story, it was easy to bring life to him. Bonnie, as he

Not everyone is going to like what you write The one undeniable fact about writing and publishing books and expressing your opinion via a blog is that you are not going to be liked, appreciated, loved or in some cases, even tolerated by some readers. While some disagree politely, others can be downright rude, and then there are even a few who think that throwing a few choice insults is fair enough. Whether it be by way of a blog comment, a blog post, a social media post or a book review, when you express an opinion, you just have to accept that you are not going to be liked by

Does Twitter spamming sell books? It’s no secret that spamming is a real no-no on social media and totally frowned upon. Then again, Then again, pop-ups on web pages are an absolute pain in the neck as well, but most marketing gurus say they work exceptionally well. Email campaigns usually end up in 1,000’s of junk email inboxes but they continue to be sent out in the billions every day. The problem is, that these techniques work when it comes to getting noticed, building an audience, and selling products, no matter how frowned upon they are. While I don’t use pop-ups or bulk email because I just find them totally obnoxious,